Post-repeal, feds move to end suit over 'don't ask, don't tell'

After the gays-in-the-military ban known as "don't ask, don't tell" became history on Tuesday, the Justice Department didn't waste any time in trying to clear the legal decks of the detritus left behind by the prior policy.

Justice Department lawyers filed a motion Tuesday afternoon asking a federal appeals court to dismiss the government's appeal of a district court judge's ruling that held DADT to be unconstitutional and banned its enforcement worldwide. That injunction, obtained last October by lawyers for the gay GOP group Log Cabin Republicans, was blocked and unblocked several times by the appeals court in recent months.

"Effective today, 10 USC § 654 [the DADT statute] is repealed, and this facial constitutional challenge to that law is now moot," the DOJ lawyers wrote. Attached to their brief, posted here, is a Defense Department memo implementing the repeal, posted here.

The government's move is widely expected but could irritate gay rights activists in one way: the Justice Department is asking the appeals court to vacate U.S. District Court Judge Virginia Phillips's findings that DADT was unconstitutional. That would make her ruling unavailable to be cited as nonbinding precedent in other court cases.